his special duties as himself, and subjected to the revision of a Congress cognizant of him only as a politician.  At the farther end of the Avenue was another department so vast in its extent and so varied in its functions that few of the really great practical workers of the land would have accepted its responsibility for ten times its salary, but which the most perfect constitution in the world handed over to men who were obliged to make it a stepping stone to future preferment.  There was another department, more suggestive of its financial functions from the occasional extravagances or economies exhibited in its payrolls,—­successive Congresses having taken other matters out of its hands,—­presided over by an official who bore the title and responsibility of the Custodian and Disburser of the Nation’s Purse, and received a salary that a bank-President would have sniffed at.  For it was part of this Constitutional Inconsistency and Administrative Absurdity that in the matter of honor, justice, fidelity to trust, and even business integrity, the official was always expected to be the superior of the Government he represented.  Yet the crowning Inconsistency was that, from time to time, it was submitted to the sovereign people to declare if these various Inconsistencies were not really the perfect expression of the most perfect Government the world had known.  And it is to be recorded that the unanimous voices of Representative, Orator, and Unfettered Poetry were that it was!

Even the public press lent itself to the Great Inconsistency.  It was as clear as crystal to the journal on one side of the Avenue that the country was going to the dogs unless the spirit of the Fathers once more reanimated the public; it was equally clear to the journal on the other side of the Avenue that only a rigid adherence to the letter of the Fathers would save the nation from decline.  It was obvious to the first-named journal that the “letter” meant Government patronage to the other journal; it was patent to that journal that the “shekels” of Senator X really animated the spirit of the Fathers.  Yet all agreed it was a great and good and perfect government,—­subject only to the predatory incursions of a Hydra-headed monster known as a “Ring.”  The Ring’s origin was wrapped in secrecy, its fecundity was alarming; but although its rapacity was preternatural, its digestion was perfect and easy.  It circumvolved all affairs in an atmosphere of mystery; it clouded all things with the dust and ashes of distrust.  All disappointment of place, of avarice, of incompetency or ambition, was clearly attributable to it.  It even permeated private and social life; there were Rings in our kitchen and household service; in our public schools, that kept the active intelligences of our children passive; there were Rings of engaging, handsome, dissolute young fellows, who kept us moral but unengaging seniors from the favors of the fair; there were subtle, conspiring Rings among our creditors, which sent us into bankruptcy and restricted our credit.  In fact it would not be hazardous to say that all that was calamitous in public and private experience was clearly traceable to that combination of power in a minority over weakness in a majority—­known as a Ring.